Some good, some bad to start 2012

The 2012 season finally got under way Friday evening with over 43k fans cheering on a young team that pretty much no one expects to amount to anything. If nothing else it just reminded me of how much people in Houston really do love the Astros. It’s not likely we’ll see new attendance records or anything this year, but there we have a strong fan base and if a good team can be put on the field the future looks bright. Even if that team is an AL team.

“The one thing that was more disappointing than anything else is [we were] the ballclub that had the fewest amount of errors in the Grapefruit League, and Opening Day we committed those four,” Astros manager Brad Mills said. “It was kind of some mental mistakes I’m more concerned about than anything else.”

“If it’s an experience thing or whatever, you just have to go through it and talk about it, and today we called the guys in our office and put on the TV screen and went through each one and what was going through their mind,” Mills said.

“[Maybe it was] young guys and Opening Day jitters,” Mills said. “Like I said [on Friday], it was really a shock. The guys had played so well and we had the fewest errors in Spring Training, and what’s going to be one of our strengths is our defense. To see those things happen last night was kind of shocking.”

It’s also worth noting that while 4 errors were charged, Jordan Schafer almost earned two more on his own by nearly misplaying a couple of routine pop ups to center field.

Slow reaction time there Jordan? Hrm…I hope you won’t make us wonder how that is happening.

The good news though is that we saw some offense from the guys. Nothing remarkable, but a pair of homers, a pair of doubles and 4 walks are good signs.

Saturday’s game was a bit more fun…

Lucas Harrell, a surprise choice for the #2 slot in the rotation, comes out and pitches a 7 inning 3 hit shutout in his season debut. He even manages a bunt single in the process. His first ML hit.

In the mean time the offense looked pretty solid, though true it was against a guy that has kids the same age as most of the starters on the club.

While the two guys with the homers on opening night (Lee/Bogusevic) ended up going 0 for 7 with a walk, Martinez went 2 for 4 with 3 RBIs and a homer and Johnson went 2 for 4 with 2 doubles and 2 runs scored. Oh yeah, and we got another homer from Schafer as well. You also had Marwin Gonzalez, a quality fielding rookie SS getting a couple of starts to start the season in place of Lowrie, getting his first ML hit to go with Harrell’s.

Then there’s the bullpen. Luckily they only coughed up 3 runs in relief of Harrell, but that’s still a big issue. Lyon looked like his old lousy self giving up a homer to the first batter he faced, though looked half way decent for the next two hitters. He managed to get out of the inning with just the one run allowed on two hits.

Wright came in afterwards and gave up two runs, though in his defense, he should have only been out there for two batters. Since we had a few runs on the board, Mills let him face another hitter. Didn’t go too well: triple Tulowitzki. Minimal damage, but still an area for concern. Things ended nicely though when Rhiner Cruz (his ML appearance) came in and struck out Cuddyer (he of the Lyon’s HR) on 4 pitches. That’s how you show the guys how to pitch.

So one more game with the Rockies this Easter afternoon with Bud Norris who may very well be one of the keys to our rotation for the next few years. Can we pull off a series win to start the season? Will we get another consecutive day of 2 homers?

I for one am looking forward to finding out.

Enjoy the day with the family at the park, or even at home in front of the tube. Baseball is back!